Tag: hearts

I’m Your Friend, a Valentine’s Day Song For Kids

Featured

Valentine’s Day is a time for children to celebrate friendships! Classroom activities like this can teach young learners how to develop healthy relationships.

To celebrate Valentine’s Day here in the United States, children often make cards or little treats for their friends. I’ve invited my friend Ava to share her thoughts about how she celebrates Valentine’s Day with her friends and classmates.

Ava shares Valentine’s Day traditions in the US

I like to celebrate holidays with music and movement! Today’s song is called “I’m Your Friend,” from my album Jump Jump Everyone. With this song, you can add valuable skills such as phonemic awareness to your lesson while celebrating Valentine’s Day and friendship.

Rhyming words

Listen for the rhyming words at the end of each line. In this song, the words mine, nine, and Valentine all rhyme. Why is rhyming important? Check out this fabulous post by Marissa Labuz. Rhyming aids memory, supports phonemic awareness, and builds listening skills. Children have fun singing songs and chants with rhyming words.

Movement

This song invites children to move in various ways, such as galloping, skipping, jumping, walking, and even skating! Developing gross motor skills is important for young learners. The movements encourage students to move from one place to another. These are called “locomotor movements.” If you have a smaller space, students can move in a small circle in their own spot.

You can sing this song with small or large classes. I usually teach this song to kindergarten and early elementary students.

Here’s a video to teach you the lyrics and the movements:

Here are the lyrics to the song:

3. I’m Your Friend words and music by Kathy Kampa

From Jump Jump Everyone CD

Chorus:

I’m your friend.

(Gesture to chest, then to a person)

You are mine.

(Gesture to person, then to heart)

Will you be my Valentine?

(Swing hands with partner or in the circle)

Repeat.

Let’s walk.

(See the notes below. Children can hold hands in a whole class circle or move with a partner.)

Verse:

  1. Walk, walk, walk with me. Walking, walking, 1-2-3,

4-5-6, 7-8-9,  Will you be my Valentine?

(Clap-4-5-6,-7-8-9) Make a heart shape with your fingers or arms by yourself or with a friend. Or give your partner a hug!

*repeat with skip, jump, slide, skate, dance

Here are Google slides for this song.

Building Social Skills

Here’s the version from the video:

Stand in one big circle. Face the middle for the chorus, and then move around the circle with the whole class for the verses. For the counting part, 4-5-6, 7-8-9, clap your hands on one side and then the other. Finally, make a heart shape using your fingers or arms.

Children face the middle, then hold hands together to move around the circle.

Once your children know this song, you can add some new challenges. Step into my English class in Tokyo, Japan. Check out how my English students added their own ideas.

Children can dance with partners. How can you help them find partners? When children are in a circle, you can walk around the circle. Have two children turn to face each other. They can do all of the movements with their partners.

Or you can use this transitional chant. Pat and clap your legs to keep the beat as you say the chant. Count slowly as you get closer to the number ten.

It’s okay for partners to be scattered around your space and move in their own little group. If you have an odd person out, make a group of three.

For elementary students, you might try this challenge. Make an inside and an outside circle. One partner stands in the inside circle, and the other in an outside circle. Partners face each other. Children can do the movements for the verse holding hands with their partner around the circle. At the end of the verse, the outside circle children move ahead to the next partner.

So you can make this as simple or as fancy as you’d like!

If you’re looking for music to play in your classroom, check out this Spotify playlist for February:

Come back to my blog to discover more fun activities that build language through music and movement. Thank you!

Celebrate Valentine's Day with this delightful song for children.

Songwriter Kathy Kampa is a passionate educator of young learners. She seeks to nurture children’s imaginations and spark creativity through fun and engaging activities. Kathy believes that music and movement should be a part of every young child’s education. Kathy’s songs for kids (Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays and Jump Jump Everyone) are available on iTunes.

Kathy uses a globally-minded and inquiry-based approach to teaching through which students develop 21st-century skills. She also supports the development of English language skills by creating songs, chants, and TPR/movement activities targeted to young learners’ needs.

For more kid-tested music and movement activities, check out more music on iTunes. Kathy has produced two music CDs for very young learners, Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays and Jump Jump Everyone, which build English language skills through music and movement while nurturing creativity and imagination! Grown and loved by real kids!

My Fingers Dance!

Featured

Fingerplays are a fun way to add movement to your lesson. Students can move their fingers while sitting. When you need an activity to bring the energy level down in your class, consider a fingerplay.

This chant teaches the heart shape (perfect for Valentine’s Day!) as well as other shapes (circle, square, rectangle, triangle, star). Notice the repetition in the phrases, which is important for young learners.

Encourage students to make shapes in different ways to nurture their creativity. Notice the great things your young learners are doing. That’s what I call CCBA–Catch Children Being Amazing!

Check out my Japanese students making shapes. Here we are studying together online. (Photos used with permission)

My students just love this chant! I hope that you do, too.

My Fingers Dance

by Kathy Kampa on Jump Jump Everyone. Available on iTunes, Spotify, and other streaming services.

My fingers, fingers, fingers, fingers, fingers dance!

My fingers, fingers, fingers, fingers, fingers dance!

Make a circle! Take a picture. Make a circle! Take a picture.

*Substitute additional shapes for “circle.”

Check out the video below for the simple motions.

This Google slide from the video provides a visual of the shapes.

The music is available on iTunes and on streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music.

Let’s practice shapes some more!

Time for a surprise! Have students open their hands and close their eyes. Hand them one of the shapes. Use this little chant I just made.

A Big Surprise by Kathy Kampa

Open your hands and close your eyes.

Get ready for a big surprise!

My students enjoy going on a shape hunt. We focus on one shape at a time, and look for things with that shape.

Kids love using the shaped “magnifying glasses” to find shapes in everyday objects around them! You can make these darling shape finders from Amber at Apples to Applique (amber@applestoapplique.com)

Learning something in many ways is fun for young learners! As Dr. Howard Gardner pointed out in his theory of Multiple Intelligences, children can learn more successfully when using many ways to approach a topic. In this lesson, students hear words in rhythm, they move their bodies, they see shapes, and they interact together.

If you’re celebrating Valentine’s Day, students can make cards with LOTS of shapes!

Finally, if you read my last post, you’ll remember how to make a heart shape with your hands. This poem was shared with me by my colleague:

    I put my hands together.  (put the heels of your hands together)

    This is how I start.  (hold)

    I curve my fingers just like this (curve your fingers to touch each other)

    and now I have a heart.  (this should make a heart shape)

    Now, look through the heart to see each of the students in your class.

    Say, “I see you in my heart!”

Songwriter Kathy Kampa is a passionate educator of young learners. She seeks to nurture children’s imaginations and spark creativity through fun and engaging activities. Kathy believes that music and movement should be a part of every young child’s education. Kathy’s songs for kids (Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays and Jump Jump Everyone) are available on iTunes.

Kathy uses a globally-minded and inquiry-based approach to teaching through which students develop 21st-century skills. She also supports the development of English language skills by creating songs, chants, and TPR/movement activities targeted to young learners’ needs. Kathy is an author and teacher-trainer with Oxford University Press.

For more kid-tested music and movement activities, check out more music on iTunes, Spotify, and Apple Music. Kathy has produced two music CDs for very young learners, Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays and Jump Jump Everyone, which build English language skills through music and movement while nurturing creativity and imagination. Grown and loved by real kids!

Check out Kathy Kampa’s YouTube channel here.